Reflection
by Shinigamilover2
Summary: Rock Dog (AU). Khampa looses his temper and snaps at Bodi, not realizing that it's hurt him deeply. When he realizes what he's done, he goes to apologize to his son, only to hear him sing of how he truly feels in his heart. Reader beward: Fluff and Angst ahead.


**A/N: I'm back with another 'Rock Dog' one-shot, and this time, it's a song-fic that centers around Bodi and his father, only this time it's an alternate scene idea, and an idea as to how the movie could have been different (Don't get me wrong, there's nothing wrong with the movie to me, I love it. But I just couldn't pass this idea up). This story takes place at the end of the failed attempt to scare Bodi straight. This idea came to me after hearing that Disney finally casted Liu Yifei as the lead in the live action adaptation of Mulan, and it got me thinking about a song from the movie that I think would fit Bodi if this scene were to be different. Anyways, enjoy!**

* * *

Fireworks illuminated the sky, loud booms silenced the crickets who usually made their chirps as the stars covered the sky, all of them coming from the Sheep Village on Snow Mountain. Bodi, the teenaged mastiff was in charge of defending the village for the night, at the request of his father, Khampa, who wanted him to take up the position of village guard seriously and not be a musician, breaking their family bloodline. Khampa thought that dressing up like a wolf, and scaring his son would snap some sense into his head, but Bodi ended up warning the villagers that there were wolves in the village, knot knowing it was his own father in disguise. The end resulted in the town's fireworks supply to go off into the night sky. Now, Khampa stared down at his son in anger.

"Dad, I didn't mean for any of this to happen" Bodi said, trying to calm his dad down as he stomped further to him. He then felt his heart begin to race when Khampa grabbed the collar of his shirt and pulled him up close to his face.

"This is all your fault! If you had been doing your job like you were supposed to do, none of this would have happened!" He screamed, fury and venomous anger in his voice. Bodi had never seen his own father this angry.

"But I was, I warned the villagers and..." Bodi tried to explain, but Khampa cut him off and continued to shout in his son's face.

"That's not your job! Your job is to FIGHT the wolves! But you ran like a cowardly pup instead!" Khampa continued. Bodi was about to say something else, but Khampa shoved him to the ground, the sheep who were in the streets gasped at the sight of this.

"You are a disgrace, Bodi! You are a disgrace to this village, to the villagers, to your mother, and to me!" Khampa screamed. Bodi now felt tears about to fall out of his eyes, the mention of his own mother, who had died months after Bodi was born, was enough to make the teenage mastiff feel pain in his naive and innocent heart.

"But, D-Dad" Bodi tried to talk, but Khampa shushed him again by shoving him against the walls of one of the buildings surrounded him.

"Be quiet! You may be a mastiff, but you will NEVER, bring your family honor" Khampa said. Bodi then ran off down the street, attempting to hold back his sobs, and covering his mouth with his paws. With Bodi out of the sights of Khampa, and the village, the sheep looked up to the older mastiff as he walked in the opposite direction, away from the town square.

* * *

Early the next morning, Khampa was now alone in the village tavers, four wooden shot-cups full of wheat-grass sat on the counter right in front of him. He heard everyone talking about how it could have been a lot worse since the firecrackers barely did any damage to the village, and other spoke about how they never saw Khampa so angry before, and that Bodi didn't deserve to be yelled at like that. Khampa then turned next to him to see the village elder, Fleetwood Yak, a Yak who was more of a parental-figure to Bodi than he ever could have been sat down next to him.

"Shot of wheat-grass, Sam. You know what? Make it a double" he said. The bar-tender served Fleetwood two wooden shot-cups similar to the ones in front of Khampa.

"You wanna talk about it?" Fleetwood asked Khampa, who was still slightly on edge from last night.

"Don't pin this on me, Fleet. If Bodi had been doing his job, guarding the village..." Khampa began to rant, but Fleetwood spoke up.

"I thought that was your job" he pointed out.

"Well, yeah it is my job. And I was doing my job" Khampa replied.

"I think you've established that. But did you really have to be so hard on Bodi? Telling him he dishonored you and everyone else? Shoving him, and bringing up his mother?" Fleetwood asked. Khampa now began to feel more calm and took a deep breath.

"I know, I shouldn't have done that. I was just so angry that Bodi wasn't taking his duties at the next guard of this village seriously, and that he wanted to play music that I lost my temper" Khampa explained.

"Bodi isn't you, he wants to go" explained the yak in a soft tone, his hoof resting on Khampa's shoulder.

"But, who's gonna look after this place when I die?" asked Khampa.

"From what? The wolves? Khampa, you're just standing up there, waiting for something that's not gonna come" Fleetwood told him.

"But what if they do?" Khampa asked.

"And what if they do? You really think Bodi's gonna be able to protect the village?" Fleetwood responded. He then began to feel regret tug at his heart.

"What have I done?" Khampa whispered to himself, one single tear falling into one of the empty wooden cups in front of him. Khampa began to sniffle and let out one single sob, something he hadn't done in a long time since his beloved wife and mother to his only pup died long before Bodi was even three months old.

"He is who he is. He's looking for his own paradise" said Fleetwood as he handed Khampa a small rectangular slip of paper with a bus on the front, it was a bus ticket to go to the city.

"I have to set things right with him" Khampa said before getting up off the stool he sat upon, and left some money on the counter for the bar-tender to pay for his drinks and then ran off to find his son.

* * *

Khampa looked all around the village, but didn't find a single trace of Bodi anywhere. He then began looking outside the village, right past the watchtower and then saw Bodi sitting on his knees by the stream. He walked towards Bodi slowly and hid behind a tree, gazing upon his son's features, his hat was off of his head, revealing his messy brown hair atop his head, and he stared down into the water.

"Bodi?" Khampa whispered to himself. Before he could approach his teenage son, he heard him begin to sing. He sang without playing his draymin/guitar.

 **"Look at me. I will never pass for a perfect guard, or a perfect son. Can it be, I'm not meant to play this part?"** Bodi sang as he took the instrument off his shoulder from the strap and set it by a rock, along with his hat. Khampa then watched Bodi begin to walk away from the stream and was still singing.

 **"Now I see, that if I were truly to be myself, I would break my father's heart"** Bodi continued. That verse really made Khampa feel worse than he did before. He then walked over to the rocks and picked the draymin and hat up into his paws and continued to follow Bodi stealthily and began to sing some more.

 **"Who is that dog I see, staring straight back at me? Why is my reflection someone I don't know?"** Khampa listened as he sang and he began to realize that the song he was singing was how he was feeling deep down in his heart right now. He didn't realize how badly he hurt Bodi until now, his own son singing about how he felt like he didn't recognize himself anymore, all because he wanted to do something that made him feel happy.

"Was I really that harsh?" Khampa silently asked himself as he followed Bodi to their own house and watched as he approached the small shrine that sat at the other end of the room. A small shelf covered in candles, and a large photo of Bodi's mother hung up on the wall above the candles.

 **"Who is that perfect guard? It's not me, I've tried hard!"** Bodi continued to sing. Now he was on his knees again and bowed down to the shrine, his paws together and his forehead resting on them, tears falling from his chocolate brown eyes as they were shut tightly while he sang. He then sat back up and looked at the picture of his mother, as well as his own reflection in the glass that guarded the picture.

 **"When will my reflection show, who I am inside?"** Bodi sang before walking over to the mirror on the other side of the room and placed his paw on the surface while staring at himself, as well as continuing his song, tears brimming at the edges of his eyes, and his voice staring to break while he sang.

 **"Now I pray, that a time will come I can free myself, from his expectations"** he sang with some slight desperation in his voice before walking out the door, Khampa hiding behind the corner to watch Bodi walk away from the house and ran out into the grassy field again.

 **"On that day! I'll discover someway to be myself, and to make my father proud!"** sang Bodi as he had one paw over his heart, a heart that was shattered by the anger and disappointment of his father, who unbeknownst to him was regretting every moment he spent yelling at him last night, and was watching and following him as he was singing. Khampa then followed Bodi down by the stream again, only it was by a large cherry blossom tree with a red painted bench right next to it. Bodi remembered his mother used to take him down to that tree to sing to him and play with him every afternoon until she died.

 **"He wants a docile lamb! He doesn't know, who I am! Must there be a secret me, I'm forced to hide?"** Bodi sang while he had a paw on the trunk of the tree and looked up at it's pink blossoms. Khampa now stood fifteen feet away from Bodi, he didn't even notice Fleetwood Yak and a few other sheep had followed him down and watched the older mastiff watch the younger one sing.

 **"Must I pretend that I'm someone else, for all time? When will my reflection show, who I am inside!?"** Bodi said while he stared down at the water again, wiping his streaming tears away as he held his high-note at the end.

 **"When will my reflection show, who I am inside?"** Bodi finally finished his song and sat down on the bench, now beginning to sob and sniffle freely, the tears coming back like a waterfall down the sides of his face, and into his lap, soaking themselves into his pants.

"I didn't even know... I should have..." Khampa said while looking down at the instrument he still held in his paws.

"Yes, you should have. But now is not the time for that" Fleetwood said, his voice catching Khampa's attention and causing him to turn his head around to face the elderly yak and the villagers.

"What do I do, Fleet?" Khampa asked.

"Go to him, he needs his father. He needs to know you regret everything you said, and that you didn't mean it. Let him be who he wants to be, instead of what you want him to be" Fleetwood told him. Khampa then looked down to the other sheep, who nodded in agreement. Khampa then looked forward and took a deep breath before walking forth towards his son.

"Ah-hem" he cleared his throat to get Bodi's attention. Bodi looked behind him to see Khampa, holding his hat and guitar in his paws, a small smile on his face, but the younger mastiff looked away and to his left side, right next to a cherry blossom petal that fell down right on the edge of the bench next to him, believing his dad was still mad with him. Khampa lost his smile and set his son's guitar and hat against the right side of the bench before sitting right next to him.

"I'm uh... surprised you have your hat off, you hardly ever go anywhere without it. But I like it when you show your hair off like that, it looks good" Khampa said, trying to make small talk to try and lighten the mood, but Bodi didn't respond. Khampa then sighed to himself.

"Nobody said this was going to be easy" he thought to himself before he looked to his son and placed a paw on his shoulder.

"Bodi, please look at me" Khampa softly plead to him. Bodi then felt his father's other paw placed under his chin and turned his head over to meet his father's emerald green eyes looking down upon him, not in a menacing way though, but in a kind and forgiving way.

"I shouldn't have said the things I said last night to you. Words like that can be extremely hurtful, and weigh heavy on someone young like yourself" Khampa began. Bodi was surprised, his own father was apologizing to him for the horrible things he said to him.

"But I thought I dishonored everyone" Bodi said.

"No, you didn't. You actually make everyone very proud, including me" said Khampa.

"And mom?" asked Bodi, remembering what he said about dishonoring his mother, and how she would be disappointed in him.

"Yes, even mom. I shouldn't have brought her up either, I know you think about her often, and that it's a very sensitive topic for you to talk about with others, even me" Khampa told him. Bodi didn't respond to what his father just said, instead he just smiled with salty tears still coming down his eyes. Khampa then gently wiped his son's tears with his thumb.

"Bodi, I heard you singing. Is that how you really feel?" Khampa asked, bringing up Bodi's song from earlier.

"Well, yeah. I always feared I'd never be happy because I never got to be who I was. Living under all that pressure of becoming a guard made me feel like that, and it made it harder to try and stay happy" Bodi explained. Hearing his son's explanation as to what the song meant made Khampa feel bad.

"Well, I'm sorry. And I promise to never make you feel like that ever again" Khampa said before he gently pulled Bodi in for a gentle hug. The young mastiff returned the hug and buried his face in the crook of his father's neck and let more tears fall from his eyes and soaking Khampa's fur. After a while, Khampa broke the hug apart and he pulled the ticket that Fleetwood gave him earlier out of his pants pocket and handed it to Bodi.

"W-What's this?" asked Bodi.

"Go, go to the city. Pursue your dream" said Khampa. Bodi was now in shock, he was being allowed to be a musician like Angus Scattergood.

"But what about the village?" Bodi asked.

"Don't worry about that. This is YOUR life, and you should do what your heart wants you to do, to make it a happy one" Khampa said. Bodi then launched himself forward and hugged Khampa again. Khampa hugged back with one arm, taking up the guitar and Bodi's hat with the other one and handing them to him.

"Thanks" Bodi said before putting the hat back on, and placing the guitar around his shoulder. Khampa then began to walk with Bodi down to the bus stop. The two of them waited for it to arrive, and as soon as the bus stopped where they stood, Khampa gave Bodi one last hug before letting out four simple words.

"I love you son" Bodi then hugged back.

"I love you to, dad" Bodi replied before he broke apart and got on board the bus. He was happy knowing his son forgived him, and loved him, and that was all that mattered to him.

* * *

 **A/N: There you have it. My first Rock Dog story that focused on Bodi and Khampa. I hope it provoked some feels for you guys. Also, the additional lyrics in the song were only used in the deleted scenes of 'Mulan', but I changed the lyrics for it to make more sense with the story. Hope you guys liked it! Please review, thanks!**


End file.
